#310 Walt Disney and Picasso
Founders
The Power of Focus and Its Personal Costs
This chapter explores the intense focus and drive of historical entrepreneurs, examining the powerful yet demanding nature of ambition. It discusses the personal sacrifices involved, particularly in terms of relationships and life balance, highlighting the need to counteract the pitfalls of extreme dedication.
What I learned from reading Creators: From Chaucer and Durer to Picasso and Disney by Paul Johnson.
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(3:30) Disney made use of the new technologies throughout his creative life.
(4:45) Lists of Paul Johnson books and episodes:
Churchill by Paul Johnson. (Founders #225)
Heroes: From Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar to Churchill and de Gaulle by Paul Johnson.(Founders #226)
Mozart: A Life by Paul Johnson. (Founders #240)
Socrates: A Man for Our Times by Paul Johnson. (Founders #252)
(5:55) Picasso was essentially self-taught, self-directed, self-promoted, emotionally educated in the teeming brothels of the city, a small but powerfully built monster of assured egoism.
(7:30) Most good copywriters fall into two categories. Poets. And killers. Poets see an ad as an end. Killers as a means to an end. If you are both killer and poet, you get rich. — Confessions of an Advertising Man by David Ogilvy. (Founders #306)
(10:00) Whatever you do, you must do it with gusto, you must do it in volume. It is a case of repeat, repeat, repeat. — Les Schwab Pride In Performance: Keep It Going! by Les Schwab. (Founders #105)
(11:30) Picasso averaged one new piece of artwork every day of his life from age 20 until his death at age 91. He created something new every day for 71 years.
(15:30) Power doesn't always corrupt. But what power always does is reveal. — Working by Robert Caro (Founders #305)
(17:30) Many people find it hard to accept that a great writer, painter, or musician can be evil. But the historical evidence shows, again and again, that evil and creative genius can exist side by side in the same person. In my judgment his monumental selfishness and malignity were inextricably linked to his achievement.
He was all-powerful as an originator and aesthetic entrepreneur precisely because he was so passionately devoted to what he was doing, to the exclusion of any other feelings whatever.
He had no sense of duty except to himself, and this gave him his overwhelming self-promoting energy. Equally, his egoism enabled him to turn away from nature and into himself with a concentration which is awe-inspiring.
(21:30) It shows painfully how even vast creative achievement and unparalleled worldly success can fail to bring happiness.
(24:00) Walt Disney (at age 18) wanted to run his own business and be his own master. He had the American entrepreneurial spirit to an unusual degree.
(27:00) Recurring theme: Knowing what you want to do but not knowing how to do it—yet.
(26:20) All creative individuals build on the works of their predecessors. No one creates in vacuum.
(28:30) Why Walt Disney moved to Hollywood: The early 1920s, full of hope and daring, were a classic period for American free enterprise, and for anyone interested in the arts—Hollywood was a rapidly expanding focus of innovation.
(28:00) Filmaker episodes:
Francis Ford Coppola: A Filmmaker's Life by Michael Schumacher. (Founders #242)
Steven Spielberg: A Biography by Joseph McBride. (Founders #209)
George Lucas: A Life by Brian Jay Jones. (Founders #35)
(30:10) The relentless resourcefulness of a young Walt Disney!
(34:30) This is wild: It is significant that Mickey Mouse, in the year of his greatest popularity, 1933, received over 800,000 fan letters, the largest ever recorded in show business, at any time in any century.
(36:00) Something that Disney does his entire career —he has this in common with other great filmmakers— he is always jumping on the new technology of his day.
(37:00) Lack of resources is actually a feature. It’s the benefit. — Kevin Kelly on Invest Like the Best #334
(38:45) Imagination rules the world. — The Mind of Napoleon: A Selection of His Written and Spoken Words edited by J. Christopher Herold. (Founders #302)
(41:15) Disney put excellence before any other consideration.
(41:45) Disney hired the best artists he could get and gave them tasks to the limits of their capacities.
(47:45) Disney’s Land: Walt Disney and the Invention of the Amusement Park That Changed the World by Richard Snow. (Founders #158)
(49:30) I Had Lunch With Sam Zell (Founders #298)
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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth
Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast
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